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A review by mo_reads_more
Beginner's Luck by Kate Clayborn
emotional
hopeful
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
I've decided Kate Clayborn is an author whom I must read her entire body of published works. There is something about her writing that does it for me, and this one is no exception. Slow born, the best trope, and this one is a good 50% build-up where I was feeling the tension. I'm also a sucker for angst/comfort, and this book gets ANGSTY. It is arguably one of, in not the most, angsty books I've read all year. I was feeling at at like 2AM. Ben's chapter later in the book had me in pain.
While I feel strongly about this book, I feel impartial to Ben. The first half of the book, I loved this man. Did he come off sexist at first? A bit, but let's be honest, his error is an extremely common one unfortunately. Did he not do his research first? No, but it made it cuter later in the story when he was so interested in her that he went and read all of her published work and he valued her in everyway possible. Was his crush on her adorable and giving me butterflies? 100% yes. Where I started getting icky vibes from him was after they started having sex, and I think I know why this happened, but I'll get to that. After Ben and Kit started having sex, there weren't very many cute moments from Ben's point of view. This is a complaint for me because I am a sucker for the mmc's POV in a romance because I love seeing emotions from men I feel like aren't shown often in real life, and Ben went from fulfilling this requirement for me, to losing it immediately after they get together. He starts mentioning her body and how hes attracted to her breasts or neck way more than he ever did before. He doesn't even say "have sex" or "make love" with her, he literally uses the f word, which doesn't feel romantic to me. Then he kind of only thinks about sex when he's around her, to the point where there was a really cute line of him saying he wants to be the one she finds comfort in, who she loves, who is her best friend, but then he ends the statement by talking about how he wants to be the one who makes her scream when f*s her. Like that is just not romantic! It ruined Ben for me during the section of the book.
There are two possible reasons I think this may have happened. Storywise, we know Ben pretended for a long time he wanted to hang out with Kit because they were recruitment opportunities. Then, they finally kiss for the first time, and it's at that points he starts only thinking about sex. So, we could infer he was supressing those sexual thoughts until that point and so we as readers would not have been aware of them. However, I'm more inclined to believe that there was a weird shift in Ben because Clayborn may have been trying to appeal to an audience who prioritize spiciness in a novel. We know a lot of people like spice and they won't read a book unless it has some in it. Therefore, with this being her debut novel, I would not be shocked if she wrote the characters the way she wanted to and then threw in some parts of him lusting extensively after her. It's also just possible Clayborn was finding her style and just decided she didn't like adding that stuff in her future books, because I didn't see that in the other two books I have read from her. Either way, I didn't like it but I could understand why it may have been there.
Kit was a great character. She is a perfect example of a feminst character who isn't forcibly feministic. In a lot of books, female character have narration that blatantly states their feminist views so we assume they are a strong female lead, and that ends up portraying them as inauthentic. Instead, Kit shows us she is a strong female lead through her actions. She is in a male dominated field, and she addresses her struggles with that gender factor, but then we see her handle Todd. Kit gets angry when all the men in her life are pushing her to do more with her knowledge and skills when she is content with where she is in life, which is so valid, and SHOWS us her feminist ideologies without being annoying. I also don't think she makes any decisions because a man told her it was what she wanted. Ben tries to at first, for his own benefit, and then for what he thinks is her benefit, but it shows his character growth by the end when he no longer does this. Just, Kit was a great character, I loved her and her journey.
This was a digitally published book first before going to print, and I'm not sure if the editing is more lax for digitally released books or not, but there were a lot of grammatical issues. This is her debut novel, and luckily I went in already having two Claynorn books under my belt so I understood her writing style. There are times where I have to reread her sentences because they don't make sense at first but when I look closer I realize they are 100% right, and this is something I don't mind doing (I get distracted a lot and reread sentences anyways). However, there was an abundance of actual errors in this books. Many were repeated words/phases, or just random words that I could tell would make sense if she wrote the sentence differently, which leads me to assume it was an editing mistake. It does take away from the story a bit. There were times I was in all the feels and then there would be a big error and I would get distracted trying to figure it out. However, I still got through the book just fine and it became easier to look past.
While I feel strongly about this book, I feel impartial to Ben. The first half of the book, I loved this man. Did he come off sexist at first? A bit, but let's be honest, his error is an extremely common one unfortunately. Did he not do his research first? No, but it made it cuter later in the story when he was so interested in her that he went and read all of her published work and he valued her in everyway possible. Was his crush on her adorable and giving me butterflies? 100% yes. Where I started getting icky vibes from him was after they started having sex, and I think I know why this happened, but I'll get to that. After Ben and Kit started having sex, there weren't very many cute moments from Ben's point of view. This is a complaint for me because I am a sucker for the mmc's POV in a romance because I love seeing emotions from men I feel like aren't shown often in real life, and Ben went from fulfilling this requirement for me, to losing it immediately after they get together. He starts mentioning her body and how hes attracted to her breasts or neck way more than he ever did before. He doesn't even say "have sex" or "make love" with her, he literally uses the f word, which doesn't feel romantic to me. Then he kind of only thinks about sex when he's around her, to the point where there was a really cute line of him saying he wants to be the one she finds comfort in, who she loves, who is her best friend, but then he ends the statement by talking about how he wants to be the one who makes her scream when f*s her. Like that is just not romantic! It ruined Ben for me during the section of the book.
There are two possible reasons I think this may have happened. Storywise, we know Ben pretended for a long time he wanted to hang out with Kit because they were recruitment opportunities. Then, they finally kiss for the first time, and it's at that points he starts only thinking about sex. So, we could infer he was supressing those sexual thoughts until that point and so we as readers would not have been aware of them. However, I'm more inclined to believe that there was a weird shift in Ben because Clayborn may have been trying to appeal to an audience who prioritize spiciness in a novel. We know a lot of people like spice and they won't read a book unless it has some in it. Therefore, with this being her debut novel, I would not be shocked if she wrote the characters the way she wanted to and then threw in some parts of him lusting extensively after her. It's also just possible Clayborn was finding her style and just decided she didn't like adding that stuff in her future books, because I didn't see that in the other two books I have read from her. Either way, I didn't like it but I could understand why it may have been there.
Kit was a great character. She is a perfect example of a feminst character who isn't forcibly feministic. In a lot of books, female character have narration that blatantly states their feminist views so we assume they are a strong female lead, and that ends up portraying them as inauthentic. Instead, Kit shows us she is a strong female lead through her actions. She is in a male dominated field, and she addresses her struggles with that gender factor, but then we see her handle Todd. Kit gets angry when all the men in her life are pushing her to do more with her knowledge and skills when she is content with where she is in life, which is so valid, and SHOWS us her feminist ideologies without being annoying. I also don't think she makes any decisions because a man told her it was what she wanted. Ben tries to at first, for his own benefit, and then for what he thinks is her benefit, but it shows his character growth by the end when he no longer does this. Just, Kit was a great character, I loved her and her journey.
This was a digitally published book first before going to print, and I'm not sure if the editing is more lax for digitally released books or not, but there were a lot of grammatical issues. This is her debut novel, and luckily I went in already having two Claynorn books under my belt so I understood her writing style. There are times where I have to reread her sentences because they don't make sense at first but when I look closer I realize they are 100% right, and this is something I don't mind doing (I get distracted a lot and reread sentences anyways). However, there was an abundance of actual errors in this books. Many were repeated words/phases, or just random words that I could tell would make sense if she wrote the sentence differently, which leads me to assume it was an editing mistake. It does take away from the story a bit. There were times I was in all the feels and then there would be a big error and I would get distracted trying to figure it out. However, I still got through the book just fine and it became easier to look past.